After a dozen novels ("The Hunt for Red October," "Patriot Games" and "Clear and Present Danger"

After a dozen novels ("The Hunt for Red October," "Patriot Games" and "Clear and Present Danger" among them), Tom Clancy can still create a plot that keeps readers turning the pages.His latest political and espionage thriller, "The Teeth of the Tiger," takes as its theme the very real threat of terrorist attacks in the United States.Twins Dominic and Brian Caruso -- Dominic, an FBI agent, and Brian, a Marine -- are recruited by an agency that operates outside official government. Way outside.Their mission, should they choose to accept it, is to assassinate targeted terrorists, one by one. Although such actions are legally and morally questionable, the twins agree after a chance trip to a shopping mall puts them at the center of a terrorist attack in which innocent women and children are killed.Stirred into the mix is Jack Ryan Jr., son of former President Jack Ryan, a hero of previous Clancy novels. Jack Jr. is a cousin of the Caruso brothers and works for the same agency, but his work is more analytical.The twins are armed with only one small, but lethal, weapon. As things start to heat up, Jack Jr. leaves his desk and gets involved in the action. Despite this obvious plot device, Clancy keeps readers wanting more as he dangles the prospect that the younger Ryan and his cousins may appear in future novels.
In "Cry Havoc" by Clive Egleton, Jill Sheridan is a shrewish, superambitious rising member of Britain's secret service. So it is hard to feel sorry for her when someone spikes her drink during a Florida vacation, and she ends up unwittingly starring in a porn movie.The setup was staged by an Islamic terrorist group, which plans to blackmail Sheridan for top-secret information. But Sheridan is a clever lady. She comes clean with her boss and suggests she become a double agent to find out who is behind the deadly scheme. This entails providing the blackmailers with valuable information to win their confidence, which worries Peter Ashton, head of the Secret Intelligence Service's Eastern European desk.Ashton is also concerned about the suicide of the assistant director in charge of the Asian department. The hero of previous Clive Egleton thrillers, Ashton isn't one of those dynamic, headstrong heroes. But he is a clever, subtle operator, which is just as well, as he also has to uncover a mole, deal with his American counterparts and make sure the ambitious Sheridan doesn't steal the top job.Egleton's series about the workings of British intelligence has tracked Ashton's ups and downs, focusing as much on the politics of the service as the thrills of hunting down spies and double agents. This time, Ashton is in control.
Gene Riehl is a former FBI agent who specialized in foreign counterintelligence and espionage, and "Quantico Rules" (St. Martin's Minotaur, $24.95) is gripping when describing the agency's culture and stifling bureaucracy.Puller Monk is the agent in charge of a special inquiries squad assigned to do intensive background checks on possible White House appointees and job candidates. The squad's priority assignment is finding out all it can about federal Judge Brenda Thompson, the president's pick to be the first black woman nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court.Anxious to avoid a Clarence Thomas-type debacle, Monk and his team are instructed to dig deep into the judge's past. At first she seems squeaky clean, but then three weeks in her life before she headed to law school become murky. Meanwhile, someone is trying hard to prevent the truth coming out. There is even a man posing as an FBI agent who appears on the scene every time a would-be witnesses is dispatched.Monk has plenty of secrets of his own, including a compulsive need to gamble to forget his childhood traumas. He also has to battle the No. 2 man at the agency to get extra time to fully investigate the judge's background.
A tracking sheet would be more useful than a balance sheet when trying to wade through Christopher Reich's latest financial thriller, "The Devil's Banker."The crux of the decidedly muddled plot is an attempt by an Arab financier, Marc Gabriel, to obtain a nuclear bomb from an Israeli scientist so he can destabilize world financial markets.CIA forensic accountant Adam Chapel joins forces with Sarah Churchill, a British intelligence agent, after four of his colleagues are killed in a Paris explosion. Churchill is the ultimate in cool."Bit of a mess here, boys," she says, when calling for backup as angry Pakistanis surround and threaten to kill her while she is following a suspected terrorist.Reich, who at one time worked for a major Swiss bank, only seems in control of the action when he is explaining how money moves around the world.
Steve Barry's talky debut thriller, "The Amber Room" (Ballantine, $24.95), has a great idea that's almost drowned in a sea of pedestrian, sometimes dismal, prose.The title refers to a legendary lost treasure that was looted by the Nazis from the Soviet Union during World War II and is madly sought after here by both villains and good guys. All of them are boring and unreal, sounding alike whether they're German or American.So why read a badly written, badly edited book with no depth and micro-thin characters? The treasure hunt itself almost balances the many flaws.